Disasters and emergency response

Prime Minister Hun Sen took to Facebook on Friday to call on citizens to use water sparingly amid the worst drought in decades, also explaining that the government was trucking water to those most in need. ...

Tons of dead fish were found in the protected Tonle Chhmar Lake on Saturday, according to Ministry of Agriculture officials. The lake is a wildlife sanctuary on the edge of the Tonle Sap river in Kampong Thom’s Peam Bang commune. ...

The Kampot provincial authority started distributing clean water yesterday to drought-stricken villagers in several districts who do not have enough water for drinking and their basic daily needs such as cooking. ...

The reconstruction of the Stung Treng market, which was destroyed in a massive fire that was sparked in a jewelry shop on April 7, started yesterday, according to provincial officials. ...

Four children were injured and 136 homes were damaged in tempestuous weather conditions that thrashed villages on opposite sides of the country on Sunday, officials said on Monday.   ...

Twelve man-made fires flared up over the Khmer New Year holiday, burning down 63 houses and causing nearly $900,000 in damage, according to a Fire Department report released on Monday. ...

About 130 hectares of protected wetlands in three villages in Kampong Chhnang province’s Boribor district were consumed in forest fires last week, according to a police report issued by the Interior Ministry. ...

Key Sokha was preparing dinner for her family at their home in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district on Thursday night when a chorus of shouts broke out nearby.   ...

The Stung Treng Provincial Court on Monday charged a goldsmith, three security guards and the manager of a market in Stung Treng City for negligence that contributed to the outbreak of a fire that gutted the market on Thursday, causing an estimated $1 million in ...

Five security guards at Stung Treng Market were arrested and detained for negligence after 1,220 stalls and shops burned to the ground on Thursday night, with Prime Minister Hun Sen ordering provincial officials to rebuild the stores for the vendors. ...

More than 1,000 stalls and shops were destroyed in an over­night fire at a market in Stung Treng City, causing about $1 million in property damage, local police said on Friday. ...

Five people died and more than 200 houses in eight provinces were damaged by natural disasters in the first quarter of this year, a senior official of the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM) said yesterday. ...

As China opened one of its six dams on the upper Mekong River last month to help parched Southeast Asian countries down river cope with a record drought, it was hailed as benevolent water diplomacy. But to critics of hydroelectric dams built on the Mekong over ...

With a severe drought choking the northeast, it’s only a matter of weeks before many residents of Ratanakkiri province run dry, according to villagers, local officials and organizations working in the province. ...

Korea will provide a $13.3 million concessional loan to renovate the Stung Siem Reap Phase II flood mitigation project after a deal signed yesterday between the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Korea Export and Import Bank. ...

Two homes were completely destroyed, while 35 others and four schools were damaged, by heavy rain and strong winds in the western province of Pailin on Friday.The schools remained open despite the damage, said Seng Vanntha, deputy chief of Pailin district. ...

Up to 4,000 mostly ethnic minority people in Mondulkiri’s Keo Seima district are facing a water shortage after the local supplier announced service would be suspended due to impending widescale drought. ...

Drought in Southeast Asia is raising concerns in the Cambodian and Vietnamese countryside where salinity levels are rising in the Mekong River and people are skeptical about fresh promises from Laos that it will respect the rights of downstream countries in dam construction. ...

Almost every province in Cambodia is facing some level of drought, according to director of the Meteorology Department at the Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology Oum Ryna, but only a few provinces were facing a severe shortage of water. ...

Government officials on Wednesday applauded China’s decision to take emergency measures to counter the impact of a regional drought by releasing water into the Mekong River from the Jinghong Hydropower Station in China’s southwestern Yunnan province. ...

The Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology issued a statement yesterday encouraging the Kingdom’s citizens to be cautious around lightning storms, which occur frequently between March and July. ...

At least 27 vehicles loaded with confiscated timber were destroyed by fire while parked in the Kravanh Forestry Administration compound in Pursat province on Sunday, leaving no evidence for potential prosecution and rights groups doubting the authorities’ version of events. ...

A small-scale sand dredging business on the banks of Sraeng lake in Banteay Meanchey’s Teuk Cho commune was shut down yesterday by Preah Net Preah district authorities after it was found to be operating without a license, according to district governor Ly Sovannarith. ...

Pailin province’s first thunderstorm of 2016 claimed a victim on Friday afternoon when two farmers were struck by lightning while returning home from their fields. ...